NEW YORK—US corporate reputations are worth $3.3trillion—or more than $1 of shareholder value in every $6—according to the latest 2015 US Reputation Dividend Report.  

The eighth annual study based on analysis of more than 500 of the country’s largest public companies, has Apple reclaiming the top spot with the most economically effective corporate reputation in the S&P 500. Walt Disney is second and ExxonMobil third. J&J is back in the top ten, and AT&T gets in the leading group for the first time. Other top 10 companies include Google, Occidental Petroleum, Chevron, Nike, and Facebook.

Although slipping fractionally, at 49.5 percent, Apple’s reputation contribution—the proportion of the company’s market capitalization directly attributable to the confidence inspired by its reputation—pointed to a value of $320 billion in January 2015. As a group, the combined value of the top 10 reputations at the start of 2015 amounted to $1,165 billion, 45 percent of their total market cap.

The study underlines that while come companies are benefitting from growing reputation assets, gross reputation value across the S&P 500 is down by $325 billion, dropping below 20 percent of total market capitalization for first time in six years. Reputation Contributions were down in 70 percent of S&P 500s and in just over 10 percent of cases, corporate reputations are now destroying value. 

This is worse than recent years,” warns Reputation Dividend director Sandra Macleod, “and a surprising trend given growing boardroom attention to trust and transparency.”